Skill Set by Vernon Rush Page B

security guard. At the moment, it was empty.
    Stepping aside to allow two coverall-wearing investigators to pass, he noticed the high vaulted ceilings.
    “This way,” Foxhound insisted, heading for the elevators.
    Isaac slid into the modernized car by his boss’ side. “What have we got?” “ Suicide, ” Foxhound replied.
    “What?” Isaac blurts.
    “ Yeah, ” he nods. “I guess she gave us that confession after all,” he added, as the elevator doors opened.
    The front door of Emma Soto ’s apartment was directly in front of them, open and had a yellow police cordon stretched out across it. Foxhound grips the flimsy plastic in his right hand and lifts it. Isaac bent at the waist, ducking beneath the cordon and entered the apartment’s living room.
    The place was a mess, couch cushions tossed onto the floor, magazines on the coffee table strewn everywhere and a decanter of Scotch smashed on the hardwood floor near the window. “Someone was looking for something,” Rose noted.
    “Or she just trashed the place in a hysterical rage,” Foxhound commented. “The rest of the apartment is pretty clean, drawers don’t look disturbed. If she was looking for something, she gave up the hunt pretty quickly.”
    “Or whoever was doing the looking found whatever it was they wanted,” Rose added. “ She ’s in the bedroom,” Foxhound replied, making his cautious way to a corridor.
    Isaac followed, his eyes constantly scanning in search of something else that didn ’t make sense about the scene. He knew Soto was in an emotional state when she left her office, but that didn’t account for the mess in her living room. And even if she had been of a mind to trash her own home, why hadn’t she done exactly that? The place was pretty neat other than the slightly disheveled living space. If she’d been in a whirlwind of rage and frustration moving throughout the apartment, why was the destruction, such as it was, confined to just that one room? No, he was sure there was more to it than the simplistic view Foxhound had offered.
    The bedroom was pristine, too. Cream carpet without a mark on it, dresser with a clean surface, wardrobe doors closed, one bedside table with nothing but a lamp and an alarm clock, the opposite side table had a glass of water and a medicine bottle neatly standing in the center of the top.
    The bed itself was an antique four-poster with white sheets and a duvet. On top of the covers was the fully clothed, motionless figure of Emma Soto. She ’s was partly on her side, her right leg fully extended top while her left leg was bent at a right angle. topOne arm was resting slackly over her abdomen, the other hand was against her cheek. Her face was turned to the left, her eyes closed and just a few strands of hair covering her face. She looked like a women who had simply climbed into bed and succumbed to Morpheus as soon as her head touched the pillow.
    Isaac turns his face to Foxhound, who was standing on one side of the bed, his back near another large window covered with a sheer drape offering some privacy. However, the thicker dark brown drapes that framed the window were still wide open.
    “We need to start looking elsewhere,” Foxhound sighed, rubbing his forehead with the tips of his fingers. “If we’re going to find out who she was working with, it’s not going to be from here.”
    “ Maybe, ” Rose replied. “ Maybe not. ”
    “ Huh? ”
    “Did she leave a note?” Isaac asked.
    Foxhound shook his head. “ No. ” “Unusual,” he mumbled in reply, his gaze returning to the lifeless figure on the bed.
    “But not unheard of,” Foxhound interjected. “She probably doesn’t want to announce to the world what she did.”
    Isaac Rose was in deep thought. “All she had to say was ‘ sorry ’ , ” he pointed out. “And if she felt that bad about what she’d done, you’d think she’d want to say that much at least.”
    “Who said she was sorry?” Foxhound asked. “Likely she